The purpose of this study was to to examine what teachers think about visual art and how the learning process in this subject does look like. To answer these issues, I made interviews with five teachers of visual art from different schools, and I examined several examples of pupils’ artworks. The stories of the teachers were analyzed in relation to governing documents and with assumptions from sociocultural theory, postmodernism and pedagogical - aesthetic research as theoretical point of view.

By the qualitative interview method, the observations of the pupil’s artworks, and by the analysis of the interviews with the teachers, I have come to the conclusion that teachers think differently about art but they try to keep themselves in line with the national governing documents. Its affects aspects of disciplines, styles, techniques and medium that is exemplified by the pupil’s art works, and it points out similarities and differences between the pupil’s art works and between the teachers when teaching visual art.

This is a qualitative study about Art transformation and commodification in the digital age. The study applies a rhetoric analysis with the aim to understand how art sellers, gallery owners and entrepreneurs take part in this transformation process through their websites’ presentation texts ”about us”. The analysis is related to communication theories but it is also inspired by other theories such as Gramsci’s hegemony theory and Bourdieu’s cultural critical theory. The study shows that in an environment of ”Global Communication”, activities that are related to the visual art on the net are strongly influenced by the commodification. Marketers and business managers have a big advantage of this phase of change in Art activities on the net. As senders in a one-way communication process, they use their rhetorical skills in their presentation texts to build identities or to enhance their business, depending on the positions of power they have in the market. They invest in art and artists, in order to expand their businesses and to capture a wider audience of recipients on World Wide Web to get more money and power. The study recommends further research about the Art commodification, preferably from the receiver’s and the artists’ sides to reveal more aspects of the effects of this transformation process in Art and its values.

This study has the goal to analyze the strategy used by the Mapuche poets so called collage ethno-linguistic and to reveal how it is used by their authors. Given that we will analyze poems in which its authors are Mapuche, we want to investigate whether their own worldview, culture and religiosity is reflected into the poem.

For this purpose we will analyze three poems written by the Chilean Mapuche poets in order to have the proper overview of their lyrical poetry. Those poems are “Huida”, by Maribel Mora Curriao, “Quila” from Pedro Alonzo Retamal, and “Desde aquí” from the poet Jaqueline Caniguán. On the other hand we will also inquire into other papers of several researchers that have studied the ethno-literature, such as Iván and Hugo Carrasco Muñoz and the paper written by the researcher Maria Ester Greve in order to support our investigation.

In Sweden sports journalism has been critisised among many for lacking professionalism and sports journalists have been accused of being both restricted and biased. Especially in local sports journalism the issue is said to be evenmore prominent.Through a qualitative discourse analysis the main purpose of this essay is to study the standard of objectivity in swedish local sports journalism.Thirty two randomly selected articles written in ten local newspapers after ten games in swedish footballs top divison Allsvenskan were read and analyzed during the study. In relation to the profesional ideals of journalism some major themes of shortcomings were discovered and categorized. The most significant was the lack of hearing both sides. The reporting was very one-sided in a way that most of the time favored the local team. From an objective view questionable reporting was also found when it came to the inclusion and exclusion of certain in-game situations but also in what surrounding circumstances the journalists chose to aim their focus on. Uncertaincies were likewise exposed in the amount of personal opinions being shown by the author.

The study of states, their expansion and interaction has always been an important part of political history and often involves military as well as economic perspectives. Relations between economic capital and means of coercion is according to Charles Tilly an integral part of the state and the security policies of early modern states included a high degree of resource mobilisation, preparation for and making of war. How were these problems meant to be solved and what really happened? These historical problems are brought together in this thesis to examine the Swedish government's intentions in the form of military and resource strategic objectives, how these were implemented in the form of rules and regulations and how this was followed by the armed forces in reality. By analysing strategical and operational plans, regulatory documents and muster-rolls with the help of Tillys statemaking theories as well as Lars Wedins strategical analysis model, the thesis sets out to define the swedish states' foreign policy, military doctrine and strategy, compare regulations with reality and evaluate the ties between theory and practice.The study shows that geopolitical factors created demands for a new general military strategy that was based on warfare with higher mobility in the border provinces of the swedish realm. The security policy seems to have been an expression of the unity of the swedish state, however, the conflict between aristocratic and royal interests shows an interesting dynamic within the political system that is characteristic for the period. The resource strategy that supported the developing doctrine of mobile warfare in Sweden was based on a well equipped fleet, a smaller and more manageble baggage train for the infantry and a military storage system that together would enable faster responses, better transport and supply capability and a more agile defence that differed from the previous fortification doctine. The strategy for procuring and maintaining of outfitting and equipment of the infantry was decentralised during the early 1800's and the civil society became more involved in the resource mobilisation. This constituted a nationalisation of resource strategical means that aimed to alleviate the natural economic limitations in Sweden.The muster-rolls of Västerbottens' infantry regiment shows that the regulations were implemented in reality but that a deficient transport capability caused by disrupted supply lines and slow aquisition of new equipment led to a sometimes severe shortage of equipment and uniforms. Apart from the deficiencies there were substantial changes to more practical equipment in line with the mobile military doctrine and security policy of Sweden. In conclusion, a clear connection between political goals, regulatory documents and implemented changes are seen and an organic relationship between intention, regulation and reality. Further investigation of these historical problems, with ample source material and useful theoretic models in a swedish context, is encouraged.

Continuous technological advances in surveying, computing and digital-content delivery are strongly contributing to a change in the way Cultural Heritage is "perceived": new tools and methodologies for documentation, reconstruction and research are being created to assist not only scholars, but also to reach more potential users (e.g. students and tourists) willing to access more detailed information about art history and archaeology. 3D computer-simulated models, sometimes set in virtual landscapes, offer for example the chance to explore possible hypothetical reconstructions, while on-line GIS resources can help interactive analyses of relationships and change over space and time. While for some research purposes a traditional 2D approach may suffice, this is not the case for more complex analyses concerning spatial and temporal features of architecture, like for example the relationship of architecture and landscape, visibility studies etc. The project aims therefore at creating a tool, called "QueryArch3D" tool, which enables the web-based visualisation and queries of an interactive, multi-resolution 3D model in the framework of Cultural Heritage. More specifically, a complete Maya archaeological site, located in Copan (Honduras), has been chosen as case study to test and demonstrate the platform's capabilities. Much of the site has been surveyed and modelled at different levels of detail (LoD) and the geometric model has been semantically segmented and integrated with attribute data gathered from several external data sources. The paper describes the characteristics of the research work, along with its implementation issues and the initial results of the developed prototype. [GRAPHICS] .

This master thesis deals with two case studies in environmental archaeology and battlefield archaeology focusing on two major events in the late history of the Swedish coastal town Umeå and its nearby village Sävar. Established in the early 1600's, Umeå was known for its export of timber and import of cereals. The town has suffered from numerous fires, the fire in 1888 being the most devastating. Few written records of the town remain from before the 1900's. The latest war in Sweden's history is documented in historical sources and took place at Krutbrånet, Sävar where the Swedish troops suffered defeat against the russian forces in 1809. The old port in Umeå has not been previously excavated archaeologically and only a small part of the battlefield area at Krutbrånet has been surveyed. Neither of the sites have yet been protected sites under Swedish heritage conservation act. The purpose of these two case studies is to present new research results from these two sites.In the first case study, archaeobotany and soil chemistry methods were used to analyse soil samples from undisturbed cultural layers in a construction trench at the old port of Umeå. A thick burnt layer consisted of charcoal, oats and weeds, suggesting storage and possibly intended as food for horses. Oat and pea were radiocarbon dated to most likely late 1800's which places the burned layer with oats to the big city fire in 1888. The area could have intact cultural layers that are important to investigate for understanding the unknown history of Umeås old port.The basis for the second case study is the material evidence of lead musket bullets found during a small field survey at Krutbrånet, conducted in 2010. The bullets were studied using X-ray Fluorescence together with spatial analysis to determine if troop nationality could be possible to distinguish based on composition, characteristics and spatial positions. The results revealed bullets in varied sizes and composed of lead but also alloys of copper, antimony and tin that appear in mixed quantities spread in all the studied areas of the battlefield. Field surveys of uninvestigated areas at Krutbrånet are needed to understand the context of the studied material and of troop formations. Further studies could also be isotope analyses to determine the origins of the oats and bullets.

The aim of the study was to examine whether an intervention with the Rydaholms method leads to better decoding skills, improved reading comprehension and increased interest in reading. The participants were the third grade primary school children. A five-week training with the method was performed and children's results in reading speed, decoding and reading comprehension were compared to the pretest results. The interest in reading was measured with a questionnaire prior and after the invention was done. The results showed that the children had improved their decoding but not their reading comprehension. All the children reported a higher level of reading interest after the intervention. The results are discussed in relation to the research favoring training in spelling and decoding as a primary method to improve both decoding and reading comprehension and methods that combine training in spelling and comprehension. The study could show that improved decoding skills do not automatically lead to better reading comprehension due to a short-term memory advantage but training in comprehension strategies is needed. The finding that improved decoding lead to increased interest in reading gives support for the research that claims that decoding skills are fundamental for children's own view on reading.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the Nordic Councils’ language policy as norm and practice in Sweden and Iceland. The study covers how the policy is represented in governing documents, how teachers relate to the policy in attitudes and in teaching, and what differences and similarities can be seen in both countries. The study consists of qualitative interviews with Icelandic and Swedish teachers. The material was analysed by a theoretical framework set up by earlier studies done in the relevant field of research. The findings show that the aims of the Nordic language policy are not entirely met for various reasons. There are discrepancies between teachers’ praxis and school curriculums in Iceland. Nordic languages are peripheral and vague subjects in the Swedish teacher’s praxis. Both countries have similar attitudes towards Nordic languages and the purpose of teaching coincide between the countries and the Nordic Council.

A comprehensive study has been launched in the medieval fortress of Carcassonne involving a cooperation between the universities of Umeå and Rennes, and the research institute of IRSTEA of Montpellier. This study aims to combine several spectroscopic techniques in order to resolve archaeological problems related to which raw materials were used during the city wall construction, and also to improve our understanding of the different phases of construction and use of the city walls. This study was also used for elucidating the different qualities and weak points of the applied field methods.

This dissertation is devoted to the study of who used the formal channels of interaction in the early modern era and why. It examines the full range of the political conversation in early modern Sweden, as seen in the supplications to the Diet in the Age of Liberty (1719–1772), and more specifically the supplications submitted to the parliamentary committee tasked with handling them, the Screening Deputation. The literature yields few systematic studies of this official channel, and supplications have long been terra incognita in the early modern political landscape. Their exact importance is uncertain, to say the least.

Using a database built on three samples from the beginning, middle, and end of the Age of Liberty, the Diet's supplication channel is shown to have been used by two groups: supplicants from state-affiliated households primarily tried to use it to pursue their claims on the state, to settle various issues related to employment, or to receive some sort of support through hard times; and, increasingly, commoners, especially delegates in the Estate of the Burghers, used the channel for their gravamina concerning commerce, taxation, and the like, and state support for public amenities, a group for whom the Screening Deputation offered an alternative route to getting their grievances heard by the Diet. Both groups increasingly used the Diet's supplication channel was appeal the verdicts of the King in Council (Kungl. Maj:t). Although most were not appeals against the Judicial Audit, the results reveal an active use of appeals, and thus a de facto erosion of Kungl. Maj:t's supremacy. The results also show that as many as three-fifths of all supplicants had their supplications accepted by the Screening Deputation for further examination by the Diet. Although the acceptance rate was definitely lower in the 1730s and 1740s, the committee seems to have been fairly benevolent in its interpretation of the rules on petitioning.

The results, lastly, show that although the Diet's supplication channel allowed excluded groups direct access to the Diet - including women of all classes, commoners of rank, and unrepresented groups - it mainly catered to men with the social status or wealth that put them in the middle and upper strata of society. Although this supplication channel stood open to anyone, its egalitarian potential was seemingly never realized. The use of March and Olsen's institutional theory about the logic of appropriateness, has revealed that certain institutional templates and norms that would have enabled these groups more access to the channel succumbed and made room for other institutional foundations.

Supplications were part of the medieval and early modern centralization of legal and political power, the formation of the state, the protection of the privileges of Swedish subjects, and, during the Age of Liberty, the power struggle between the Diet and the kings. Each supplication viewed by itself might seem trivial, but nonetheless played a part in each and every one of these major processes. An ordinary Swede could have an impact on early modern politics when acting in concert with other supplicants, like rain eating away at rock.

This thesis is about exploring the politics within and around research. The starting point is a European project which ran from late 1997 to the end of 2000. It was called "Self-employment activities concerning women and mi­norities: their success or failure in relation to social citizenship policies" and had as its objective to provide the EU-Commission with recommendations for improved self-employment policies. Background material was comple­mented by interviews with "experts", but the main source of information was in the form of biographical interviews with the self-employed, or for­merly self-employed, themselves. The qualitative method was used as a way of researching how individuals' background and experiences influenced their decision to become self-employed as well as their tendency to use labour market policies available for starting businesses. It was also a way to find out how those policies impacted on the individuals' lives. The conse­quent recommendations included a suggestion for broadening existing policies to comprise social aspects as well as financial allowances, and also the caution that self-employment was perhaps not the best solution to labour market and social exclusion.

This latter doubt arose during project work, as did questions about methodology, the role of the researcher, and eventually about the politics that inform research. Only briefly touched upon in the project reports, these issues instead became the basis for the thesis. A reflexive rereading of the Final Report led to a critical examination of the political uses of con­cepts and categories, of how stereotypes affect research, and of the embeddedness in ethnocentric discourses of both research and researcher. The use of postcolonial and feminist theory, discourse analysis and a social constructionist perspective broadened the analytical possibilities and fur­thered understanding of the connections between politics and research. A conclusion is that a comprehensive change in the social order as well as in people's conscience is required to stem ethnic discrimination in society and the perpetuation of stereotypes and preconstructed categories in research.

The aim of the study was to investigate how reading aloud is organized in the class-room and if the teachers made any adaptations for students with reading comprehension difficulties. Three teachers and two special education teachers were interviewed about their views on reading aloud and adaptations. Two students were interviewed about their experiences of listening to read-alouds. The results of the study showed that the students appreciated to listen to their teachers reading aloud and to take part in conversations about the text. The teachers who had been educated by Skolverket, Läslyftet, used comprehension strategies during the reading aloud lessons and found the strategies to be a good adaptation for the students with comprehension problems. The special education teachers mostly worked with students with word- reading difficulties. They did not use read-alouds and comprehensions strategies in their teaching. The study also indicate the importance of implementing research in education.

This thesis has analysed the relations among the women’s movement, the state and the labour market policy during and shortly after the Second World War and to what extent this period can be characterised as a formative phase as regards gender relations. The aim has been to study women’s strategic actions in order to influence the Swedish Government’s labour market policy in the period from 1939 to 1947. The thesis shows the conflicts of interest that manifested themselves between Statens arbetsmarknadskommission (SAK, ‘the National Swedish Labour Market Commission’) and its advisory women’s group, experts on women’s issues, concerning the planning and utilisation of female labour. SAK thought that the work of the experts on female issues should only focus on the short-term labour problems caused by the national crisis situation, while the experts on women’s issues were of the opinion that they should also work with long-term labour-market issues for women. These different ways of thinking and understanding the problem originated in different views on women’s work.

The experts on women’s issues wanted to strengthen women’s position on the labour market by abolishing the wage differences between the genders, breaking the gender segregation in education, and broadening the occupational choices of girls. They had three strategies for achieving this: a strategy of professionalisation, a strategy of change, and a strategy of state feminism. The strategy of professionalisation was aimed at raising the value of traditional female work, in terms of both status and wages. The strategy of change was aimed at creating new opportunities for women to leave typical low-wage jobs and gain access to better paid jobs in male-dominated areas. The strategy of state feminism was aimed at paving the way for women in new and expanding occupational areas beside the traditional male occupations.

Can the period during and shortly after the war be characterised as a formative phase of the issue of gender relations? It is evident that this period did not involve a revolution of the societal gender order. The idea of women as reserve labour did not disappear. The post-war planners considered that, in the transition to peace, the women who had replaced men who were called up should be redeployed or retrained for employment in household work, in hotels, restaurants and cafés, in shops and in health care. In spite of the great shortage of labour in the post-war period, leading politicians and economists stuck to old ways of thinking. A clear indication on the part of the Government was that the women’s movement’s demand for long-term planning in order to utilise female labour was turned down.

One important difference from the First World War was that the Government produced peace plans for women’s work during the Second World War. The period also led to ideological and institutional consequences that could be the beginning of a change of the societal gender order. From her central position in Kommissionen för ekonomisk efterkrigsplanering (‘the Commission for economic post-war planning’), Karin Kock could see to it that women’s demands for greater occupational mobility and a loosening up of the gender division of labour had an impact on the post-war planning of the war years. The experiences of women in male industries in the Second World War, both in Sweden and abroad, showed to some extent that it was possible to change the gender division of labour.

The modern welfare state also came to correspond to a great extent to the state feminist strategy of the experts on women’s issues. With the historical formation of the welfare state a new type of occupational groups developed, the so-called welfare state professionals.

This paper has been written to find out how textile sloyd teachers and staff at second hand shops approach the thought of switching all of the brand new materials used in school sloyd today to textile waste. The research questions are about pros and cons with this idea in schoolpractice. Three sloyd teachers and three secondhand shop staffs has been interviewed. Sustainable developement has been focus in the essay and both economic, ecological, social and cultural aspects has been taken into consideration. The conclusion is that the subject is very complex and it is hard to give a clear solution on how textile waste in schools could be handled the best way. However it has emerged that schools have other missions that might be even more important to highlight than taking care of textile waste. Focus in textile sloyd can concentrate more on pupils responsibility for the textile they buy and take good care of their clothes, towels and curtains.

Scandinavian prehistory has hitherto received little attention in the field of history didactics. In Swedish schools, it is taught in the lower grades in accordance with traditional periodization: the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age and the Viking Age. The aim of the present thesis is to provide an overview of Scandinavian prehistory as presented by 20th- and early 21st-century history textbooks and to trace its development and revisions.

These revisions are situated in relation to contemporary society and concurrent developments in archaeological research. This study attempts to demonstrate the extent to which history textbooks and archaeological research correspond. In a long-term perspective, the textbooks form a developmental chain in which the gradual revision of historical culture is made manifest.

As presented in the textbooks, prehistoric history expresses a historical culture valid in the context of a particular era. The concept of cultural memory, a memory that extends so far back in history that it can only be mediated by someone with expert knowledge (e.g. teachers, journalists or scholars), is applied in order to observe changes in its description. Cultural memory reveals how some stories constantly recur, while others are neglected or forgotten.

The textbooks have been compared to standard archaeological works and their development and revisions have been examined from dual perspectives - "story" as cultural memory and gender. The present thesis reveals that most of the stories have been remembered and repeated for more than a century, though interpretations sometimes change along with changes in society and progress in research. A gender perspective elucidates the chores and activities ascribed to prehistoric men and women, respectively, and the changes they have undergone. Although archaeological findings have been influenced by gender research, this study indicates that society itself has had the greatest impact on the treatment of gender in the textbooks. Perceptions of "male" and "female" have changed and women have been become visible after previously being as good as ignored.

Both history textbooks and archaeological research are clearly affected by general trends in society and the textbooks under investigation have evolved from focusing on nationalistic aspects and the predominance of men to assigning equal value to people of all cultures and to the sexes.

This study deals with the consumer co-operative in Sweden, specifically The Co-operative Union and Wholesale Society and the ideas that were developed within and disseminated by this organization between the years 1899 and 1939. The main theories used in the dissertation are Max Weber’s ideal-type and Norbert Elias’ civilization process.

Initially, the dissertation describes the roots of the co-operative movement in Sweden and subsequently, the informal program and the organization of The Co-operative Union, formed in 1899.

From the very beginning the co-operative union fiercly attacked consumer credit. The consumer (it was often a women that was implied) would learn how to control impulses and passions and never allow her instincts to influence a decision when making a purchase. Here, the co-operative connected with economic theories that put consumption above production. Through the co-operative, every authentic need could be met through the supply of real goods. Certain products, false and/or bad, were to be avoided. The consumer should continuously debate good taste, i.e. simple, practical and beautiful goods, which answered genuine needs in society. Through debate and discussion in the public arena, insight would be gained into utility and correct aesthetics. The discussion about “natural needs” included campaigns for nutritious food and functional shops and houses. Beside this campaign in study circle activities and co-operative newspapers, the mind of the reader.

Study circles and newspaper articles directed a challenge to the woman to not only be “the woman with the basket” but also to be more efficient, i.e. planning her time in a spirit of Taylorism. This demanded both discipline and rationality in order to avoid credit, but also calmness, peace of mind and responsibility for more than just oneself. In the late 1930s she was supposed to be economist, nutrition expert, cook, cleaner, psychologist and child-raiser, all at the same time. All these were seen as factors that were a part of being a rational consumer.